1. Field of the Invention
This invention generally relates to germicidal devices and, more specifically, systems which determine operating parameters and disinfection schedules for germicidal devices and further germicidal lamp apparatuses including lens systems.
2. Description of the Related Art
The following descriptions and examples are not admitted to be prior art by virtue of their inclusion within this section.
In general, germicidal systems are designed to subject one or more surfaces and/or objects to a germicide to deactivate or kill microorganisms residing upon the surface/s and/or object/s. Applications of germicidal systems include but are not limited to sterilization, object disinfection, and room/area decontamination. Examples of sterilizing systems are those used for sterilizing surgical tools, food or pharmaceutical packaging. Examples of area/room decontaminations systems are those used in hospital rooms to disinfect the surfaces and objects therein and those used in agricultural operations, such as those which are used to breed and/or farm animals. Area/room disinfection is becoming increasingly important as pathogenic microorganisms have been shown to be present in environments and cause infections. This is especially important as antimicrobial resistant organisms are more commonly found in environments and are becoming increasingly difficult to treat.
A challenge with conventional room/area decontaminations systems is getting a germicidal agent distributed in an efficient manner to all surfaces which need to be disinfected. In particular, many conventional room/area decontamination systems are limited in the number of disinfection sources they include due to cost and size restraints. In addition, the directionality of a germicidal agent in conventional room/area decontamination systems is often fixed. As a result, conventional systems often are configured to deliver a high dose of a germicidal agent such that a high number of surfaces within a room or area may be disinfected at the same time. A problem with a high dose blanket distribution of a germicidal agent is that some portions of a room or area may be overexposed, which effectively is a waste of the germicidal agent and potentially a waste of time and/or energy to perform a disinfection process. Furthermore, in some cases, portions of a room/area may not receive enough of a germicidal agent when the germicidal agent is blanket distributed throughout a room, particularly surfaces which are a relatively far distance from a disinfection source and/or which are not in direct line with a disinfection source. Underexposure of a germicidal agent can leave a surface or object with an undesirably high number of pathogenic microorganisms, leaving persons in subsequent contact with the surfaces highly susceptible to infection.
A further problem with conventional room/area decontamination systems is a lack of consideration and precedence of objects and surfaces in a room in performing a disinfection process. As a consequence, if a disinfection process for a room/area is terminated before its allotted time, there is potential that objects and/or surfaces within the room which are likely to be highly contaminated will not have been adequately disinfected. In particular, a disinfection source of room/area decontamination system is often positioned or installed near a central point in a room (rather than near one or more particular objects) such that germicidal exposure from the source to peripheries of the room/area is substantially uniform throughout the room/area. Similarly, in cases in which a system includes multiple disinfection devices, the devices are often distributed uniformly throughout the room rather than near one or more particular objects in an effort to disinfect the entire room in a given disinfection process.
In some embodiments, a disinfection source of a room/area decontamination system may be positioned near an object or surface, such as a bed in a hospital room, but positioning a disinfection source near a particular object does not address disinfection needs of other objects or surfaces within a room/area considered likely to be highly contaminated, such as a door handle or a light switch in a room. Furthermore, when a disinfection source is fixedly installed in a particular position within a room, the effect of its location to a particular object is rendered moot if the object is moved. In cases in which a decontamination system includes disinfection source/s which are freely positionable within a room, the task of positioning the disinfection source/s is generally manual and, thus, is labor intensive and prone to placement error. Moreover, neither of these latter configurations involve analyzing the characteristics of the room (e.g., size, areal configuration and/or relative placement of objects therein) for placement of disinfection sources therein.
A number of different methods exist for disinfecting surfaces and objects, ranging from chemical methods, such as bleach, to advanced methods, such as ultraviolet (UV) disinfection. In particular, it is known that UV irradiation in the spectrum between approximately 200 nm and approximately 320 nm is effective in deactivating and, in some cases, killing microorganisms, giving reason to the use of ultraviolet light technology for disinfecting and/or sterilizing items. Some UV disinfection devices utilize a discharge lamp to generate ultraviolet light. In addition to being used for disinfection and sterilization applications, discharge lamps are used in a variety of applications to generate ultraviolet (UV) light, such as for example polymer curing. In general, discharge lamps refer to lamps which generate light by means of an internal electrical discharge between electrodes in a gas. The electrical discharge creates a plasma which supplies radiant light. In some instances, such as in mercury-vapor lamps, the light generated is continuous once the lamp is triggered. Other configurations of discharge lamps, which are often referred to as flashtubes or flashlamps, generate light for very short durations. Such discharge lamps are sometimes used to supply recurrent pulses of light and, thus, are sometimes referred to as pulsed light sources. A commonly used flashlamp is a xenon flashtube.
Although different types of discharge lamps have been investigated to provide UV light for different applications, little has been done to improve the efficiency of the ultraviolet light generated in apparatuses having discharge lamps, particularly with respect to the propagation of the ultraviolet light (i.e., distance and angle of incidence on a target object), the intensity of the ultraviolet light, and the duration of exposure of the ultraviolet light. A reason for such a lack of advancement is that many apparatuses having discharge lamps, such as food sterilization and single object disinfection devices, are configured to treat items placed in close proximity and in direct alignment with the lamp and, thus, little or no improvement in efficiency of the UV light may be realized by altering its propagation. Furthermore, many conventional single object disinfection devices utilizing flashlamps employ less than 10 pulses of the lamp and operate for less than 5 seconds and, thus, there has been little need to increase the efficiency of such pulses. Moreover, room/area decontamination systems are specifically designed to disperse light over a vast area and, thus, altering UV propagation from a system may hinder such an objective.
In addition, many apparatuses with discharge lamps are limited in application and versatility. For instance, many food sterilization and single object disinfection devices are self-contained apparatuses and are configured for treatment of specific items and, thus, do not generally include features which improve the versatility of the systems for treatment for other items or use in other applications. Furthermore, some apparatuses require time consuming and/or cumbersome provisions in order to protect a user from harm. For example, pulsed ultraviolet light technology generally utilizes xenon flashlamps which generate pulses of a broad spectrum of light from deep ultraviolet to infrared, including very bright and intense visible light. Exposure of the visible light and the ultraviolet light may be harmful and, thus, provisions such as containing the pulsed light within the confines of the apparatus or shielding windows of a room in which a room decontamination unit is used may be needed.
Accordingly, it would be beneficial to develop ultraviolet discharge lamp apparatuses having features which improve their utilization, including but not limited to features which improve the efficiency of the ultraviolet light generated, increase the versatility of the apparatuses, and reduce and/or eliminate time consuming and cumbersome provisions that are required by conventional systems. In addition, it would be beneficial to develop room/area decontamination systems which are more effective and more efficient than conventional room/area decontamination systems.